Windows 8

[Dog Pants]

The Windows 8 beta has been released amid the usual wailing and gnashing of teeth. I'm trying to stay calm, but there's a little animal part of my brain screaming about tablets and touchscreens and "death of the desktop". Despite that I'm going to try to reserve my judgement until I have a go on it. Apparently it's pretty quick, surprising with all the stuff cluttering up the desktop, and even now has very good compatibility. That's the good stuff out of the way. Let's move onto the whole touchscreen thing. I'm writing this on my iPad, and my shoulder is hurting because of it. I'm hunched over, typing one handed on a hard and non-tactile surface, with the device a foot from my face. It's RSI waiting to happen. The thought of having to do my job on a touchscreen is terrifying, and the thought of having to game on one depressing. So I'm not going to be doing that in either environment, which means that unless you can configure Win 8 to a keyboard and mouse friendly setup I can't see me ditching my lovely (expensive) Windows 7 OS any time in the next few years.

What about you lot?

[Joose]

Pretty much the same. Dont get me wrong, I think tablets are brilliant things for when you cant sit in front of a desk, but when you can there is no contest. I cant see this "death of the desktop" happening any time soon. I've nothing against them making an OS that improves the windows tablet experience, as long as it doesnt fuck with the windows desktop experience.

[HereComesPete]

Why do I want to get 8 when there's nothing wrong with 7? It's 7 with this console/tablet ideal metro interface jacked on top so it takes a bit longer to get to stuff you use infrequently whilst making frequent use things have massive icons. I like a desktop with shortcuts and whatnot.

Upgrade? - Bugger that.

[friznit]

Wait, what? It doesn't even allow for Mouse/Keyb at all? Are they nutting fucks? I'm guessing the 'fuck upgrading' reaction will be the same for all desktop users, so maybe that was their intention anyway?

[Joose]

Wait, what? It doesn't even allow for Mouse/Keyb at all?

Er...I don't know where you are getting that idea from, but afaik its entirely untrue.

[Dog Pants]

Wait, what? It doesn't even allow for Mouse/Keyb at all? Are they nutting fucks? I'm guessing the 'fuck upgrading' reaction will be the same for all desktop users, so maybe that was their intention anyway?

No no no, it does allow for mouses and keyboardses, it's just that rather than having a traditional Windows desktop it has big square buttons, like a Windows phone. That's quite nice to touch, as it happens, but with a mouse and keyboard it seems unnecessarily clunky, like those huge keyboards designed for kids and Berk. No desktop, no start menu. That's not to say you can't turn all that off (I don't know either way), but I've seen it in the flesh and it seems counter intuitive. And my shoulder is aching again.

[Mr. Johnson]

From what I remember Windows OS's always go like this: good-shockingly bad-good-shockingly bad-good-etc.
So I'm going to stick with windows 7 for a good long while.

[HereComesPete]

You can turn it all off with some options tweaking, so it's then windows 7.

[FatherJack]

I've had access to an earlier release and posted the link here, but never got around to trying it.

It rather reminds me of Windows Media Centre - or rather Windows XP Media Center Edition, which was optimised for use on a TV with a remote control, but ended up being shipped with a number of budget PCs as a cost-saving measure. Once you'd got it booting to the regular shell instead of the Media Centre, it was basically XP.

On the surface it may seem like a last-gasp attempt to jump on the mobile or mobile-style OS bandwagon, as Windows Phone 7 the successor to Windows Mobile the successor to Windows CE isn't exactly setting the world on fire, as if perhaps they thought that making PCs act and feel like Windows Phones (aka Metro-style) would make everyone see it as a de-facto OS - in much the same way that the Nokia interface heavily influenced all early mobile phones, such that anyone could use one.

I don't think that is their cunning plan, though - as about the only new thing besides what is basically a Media Centre-like overlay is that at the core level they have added support for ARM microprocessors. These are the cores used in the majority of smartphones, including your Androids and iPhones, and even in digital cameras, sat-navs, iPods, the Nintendo DS and of course the iPad. Now the master plan becomes obvious - it's not about making your PC act like a phone, it's about an OS that is potentially ubiquitous across any clever electronic device you own. Like the iPad, but hate iOS? Stick Windows 8 on it. Frustrated by lack of interoperability between your devices? Slap 8 on.

What we're seeing is a very fast (fast-booting, demostrably) OS with Windows 7 compatibility in it, that can theoretically be installed on almost anything with half a brain. What has always put me off Apple devices is the need to put horrible Apple software on my PC for them to talk and the "there's an app for that" mentality - where I am directed to a store where I have to hope someone has made an app for what I want to do and then have to pay for it, rather than simply utilise the extensive software library I already have.

Java on phones was supposed to solve this problem years ago, but the growth of App Stores has proved too lucrative for the interested parties to ignore. This isn't going to make iPads any cheaper, and while we might just be swapping one monopoly for another as Microsoft's intentions are hardly altruistic, it may come about that we can can buy the slimmest, most attractive tablet computer, yet still have the OS of our choice with it communicating seamlessly with our regular PC without having to shove Bonjour up it's arse or whatever the fuck you have to do.

I don't think the ARM compatibility extends beyond being able to run Windows 8, though - so any old apps likely won't run unless they're on Intel or AMD - so gorilla.bas on an iPad may remain a pipedream, but with Visual Studio updated for Win 8, there is a reasonable possibility that many older apps can be recompiled to run under the new architecture, which is interesting if nothing else. There will doubtless be a version of MS Office that runs - natively - on it, which will be a deal-clicher for many. Also, Win 8 can use a mouse and keyboard, with the tablet as the screen - iOS can't do that, and Android tries but falls short. In the business sector at least, these things will matter a lot.

[Stoat]

Just a note: you can connect a keyboard to an iPad, through the Camera Connector. Obviously. There's the official bluetooth keyboard option too.

Office on ARM is confirmed, and bizarre. As far as I can work out, Office is the only thing allowed to use the Win7-era Aero UI. You can't side-load, so any programs have to come from the Store, and the Store only contains Metro apps. Simple recompiling would seem to be out, unless Visual Studio can convert the old APIs to WinRT.

[eRabbit]

I had the Developer Preview on a moderately crappy Intel tablet I got at a conference, and I just shoved the Consumer Preview onto it. It's improved a lot in usability since the Dev preview, mouse and keyboard with the traditional desktop works pretty much the same, a more traditional start menu appears if you hover the mouse at the bottom left of the screen rather than click a button etc. It's not perfect, and it still feels a bit like a touch UI and traditional desktop slammed together but it's getting better.

You can't side-load, so any programs have to come from the Store, and the Store only contains Metro apps.

Is this on the Consumer Preview? I haven't installed anything yet but on the Dev Preview I downloaded many applications off the interwebs and installed them like any other Windows OS in the dekstop mode.

[Stoat]

Is this on the Consumer Preview? I haven't installed anything yet but on the Dev Preview I downloaded many applications off the interwebs and installed them like any other Windows OS in the dekstop mode.

Ah, sorry. Looks like I had that backwards- The Store is the only place you can get Metro apps. It's still only Office on the 'Desktop' for ARM though.

[spoodie]

Windows 8 has some nice additions to the Windows Explorer, such as better file copying dialog and control, an up one directory level button and ribbon menu (if you like that kind of thing). Plus a context sensitive ribbon menu, eg. image control options for an image folder. Not really enough to warrant a Windows 7 upgrade for desktop PC though.

I've never been entirely convinced by this faster start-up feature in Windows 7. It's better than it was, but once logged in I still have to wait for things to finish loading in the background before the desktop is actually usable. It's kind of an illusion.

[Dog Pants]

Fast booting isn't a huge selling point for me either. I only do it once a day usually, and I can wait a few minutes. Of course one of the big reasons I love the iPad is that it 'boots' (it's actually in standby) instantly, and I'd happily buy a tablet with Win 8 to fill the same role, prefer it over iOS even, but for my desktop I'm not that bothered.

[buzzmong]

Win 7 has fast booting? This is news to me.

[HereComesPete]

I never turn my pc off unless it has the updates to be done. Otherwise it just goes in to standby which means it takes about 2 seconds to be logged in and ready to go again.

[mrbobbins]

I never turn my pc off unless it has the updates to be done. Otherwise it just goes in to standby which means it takes about 2 seconds to be logged in and ready to go again wank.

Fix'd.